He looks as if he was
going to make some one president. I suppose he feels so. There's
Johnny McLean. I hope he'll be taken--he's the nicest boy in the
whole junior class--but I'm afraid. He hasn't done anything
in particular."
With that, a thrill caught the most callous of the hundreds of
spectators; a stillness fixed the shifting crowd; from the tower
of Battell chapel, close by, the college bell clanged the stroke
of five; before it stopped striking the first two juniors
would be tapped.
The dominating, unhurried note rang, echoed, and began to
die away as they saw Brant's hand fall on Bob Floyd's shoulder.
The crew captain whirled and leaped, unseeing, through the crowd.
A great shout rose; all over the campus the people surged like
a wind-driven wave toward the two rushing figures, and everywhere
some one cried, "Floyd has gone Bones!" and the exciting business
had begun.
One looks at the smooth faces of boys of twenty and wonders what
the sculptor Life is going to make of them. Those who have known
his work know what sharp tools are in his kit; they know the tragic
possibilities as well as the happy ones of those inevitable strokes;
they shrink a bit as they look at the smooth faces of the boys
and realize how that clay must be moulded in the workshop--how
the strong lines which ought to be there some day must come from
the cutting of pain and the grinding of care and the push and
weight of responsibility.
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